Massa takes pole; Force India's Fisichella in 17th

Published: Saturday, March 22, 2008, 17:32 [IST]

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Sepang, Malaysia, Mar 22 (UNI) After a terrible start to the Grand Prix season in Australia, the Ferrari team came roaring back with Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen finishing one-two to take the pole positions in the qualifying round of the Malyasian Formula One Grand Prix here today.

Lewis Hamilton, the winner of the Australian Grand Prix will start in the second row in fourth place in final race tomorrow.

For Ferrari doing well here was very important after both Massa and Raikkonen not finishing the Australian Grand Prix, they came back really strongly with Massa taking the pole position and Raikkonen followig in second position.

For the Force India team, Giancarlo Fisichella finished in 17th place, while the second driver Adrian Sutil was placed 21.

Driving in hot and humid conditions under heavy cloud cover, Massa was joined on the front row by Formula One world champion team-mate Kimi Raikkonen, who lapped 0.482 seconds slower than the pole sitter's time of 1:35.748.

The McLarens of Hekki Kovalainen and championship leader Lewis Hamilton will make up the second row, ahead of Italy's Jarno Trulli in a Toyota.

McLaren never looked like matching the pace of the Ferraris and Heikki Kovalainen settled for third ahead of British team-mate Lewis Hamilton.

Jarno Trulli took a surprise fifth for Toyota ahead of the two BMW Saubers.

The newly-laid track in Sepang suited the Ferraris and Massa repeated last year's feat by taking pole again.

The Brazilian was comfortably clear of the field and his team-mate Raikkonen and was pleased to take pole after a disastrous opening Grand Prix in Australia, where he was forced to retire from the race.